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Friday, May 7, 2010

Eugene Half Marathon Pre- Race Report

While I admit I am on a high from my race on the weekend, I have been putting off writing this blog all week. I don't know what it is, but race reports I tend to dread as they take a lot of effort rather than the usual rambling I just do. Today is my last opportunity to write it as I will be back to work for Saturday and Sunday so if I do not do it today, it won't get done until next week. So here it is, Part One, which includes all pre-race stuff.

The trip down began EARLY. I was in bed by 12:30 and the alarm went off at 4:20. I was going to set it for 4:15; however, I opted to give myself the extra 5 minutes, which is why I chose the random time of 4:20. I had all my stuff ready, so I basically got up, got dressed, made myself look somewhat decent and put together some food I had ready in the fridge. Before I knew it, the crew was in my drive way.

5:15am ferry to Tsawwassen (aka Vancouver). The one nice part about the early ferry is that it is never (rarely) busy. We passed the 2 hour ferry ride with puzzles, books and magazines. I also snapped some pictures when the sun went up.

Simon and Vanessa

Mark (don't feel bad that I had to fix your Sudoku)

Before we knew it we were on our way.

No real waits at the border. Didn't our US Customs guard look friendly?

Goodbye Canada, Hello USA

Serious much?

Oh to the states, the lovely drive along the I5. We breezed through Seattle with little to no traffic

Space Needle

Home of the Mariners

Tacoma Dome

We went looking for a grocery store along the way, pulling off into a town called Du Point. It reminded us of a robot town to be honest. We figured this must be where the Intel Desperate Robot Housewives lived. I did snap a picture for Molly though!

The only traffic we hit was in Portland, so we passed the time taking fun photos

We made it to Eugene by 3:30, checking into our hotel with the lovely welcome sign

That afternoon we went for a brief shake out run around Alton Baker Park, which is where Pre's Trail is located. Beautiful park considering it is so close to the city.

We were in bed early that night, asleep around 10 I think and then we didn't drag ourselves up until after 9am. We hit up the Race Expo after having something to eat.

Race jacket which I tried on for the photo and then ended up buying it, lol

From there, we went out to the University for our Pre-Race shake out. After which we went for a photo op at Hayward Field.

Eugene has signs like this everywhere!

After Hayward, we went up the hill and visited Pre's Memorial Rock. RIP Pre (May 30th 1975)

We finished the night with some stretches and superman poses in the hotel room!